Aside from the fact that it seems this lady would give conspiracy theorists a bad name, isn't the problem in the name of the application: "E-Voting"?
Don't we want "E-Tallying" instead of E-Voting? I mean, I want to use a touch-screen kiosk and have my vote _instantly tallied_, with appropriate backups. I'm not looking to vote with my cell phone or anything, right? Who are giving requirements to these firms writing these systems, anyway? Sure -- if we're looking to do something like dial-a-vote, the system will of course be full of security holes.
We desperately need the private sector, and things like the X-Prize.
Anyone read "The Innovator's Dilemma"? The premise of the book is that radical changes (what the author calls "disruptive technologies") can never be supported by organizations attuned to the old technologies.
Getting into space cheaply is going to require disruptive technology -- big paradigm changes. Just the nature of large organizations will keep NASA from being able to recognize or implement it. Just look at their current ideas for "X-Prize"-like contests -- they want to spread too little money over too many technologies. Who wants to compete to make the best astronaut glove? It just goes to show the agency is not capable of the radical changes we need for our space program.
You say you're smart, but offer little to back it up except for wide-ranging tastes.
I would submit to you that there is a difference between a deep interest (reading up on linux or photography, taking some pictures or running a small darkroom) and honing a deep skill.
Smart people are good at all sorts of things. And people who are easily fascinated can find all sorts of neat stuff to do and play with.
If you want to succeed at anything, you're going to have to do two things: immerse yourself and surrender to your passion, and be able to do things you do not want to do. This is the balance between doing things society requires of you (socialization), and following your calling, your dreams.
Since you seem to be very good at getting slightly interested in things, I would suggest taking some time in your life to work on your socialization skills. Join the military if you have the guts, go to college or join the peace corps if you favor that. Whatever you choose, place yourself in a position where you must make a commitment and stick to it. Learn to do what others tell you to do, without question.
Then, and only then, sample around. Live and taste life -- but do so agressively, with someone in charge of your life (you). Not as a spectator, but as a participant in life. If you try hard enough, you'll find your calling. But it's up to you to prepare yourself so that when you do you'll be ready.
Come on, Nokia. Don't we geeks look stupid enough?
Now you've got us flapping our arms around at concerts trying to spell "Freebird". And just think of that waving around to make the message idea. Fairly soon you can walk into any office in the country and see people acting like a frightened chicken trying to make a point to a person 2-feet away?!?
What's next, a torso-mounted hoola-hoop that lets you surf the web? A facial-tick reader that checks the weather for you?
Whether you are waving your arm in a straght line? Seems like when you wave your arm it makes more of an arc than a line. I wonder if the phone compensates.
And you wouldn't want to send a long message on a subway -- you'd end up whacking the people around you trying to work it out. Back up, buddy! I've got a phone here!
Ok. One guy golfs, the other guy has a head like a golf ball.
Seriously. It's interesting that if I wanted to take Patrick Stewart (old baldy) up for a ride in an airplane and do 70-degree banks, we have to have a parachute. But to shoot up 100Km in suborbital flight, a Mickey-mouse T-shirt and Raybans seem to work just fine.
The real question is: who would want to fly with Patrick Stewart anyway?!? Bowl, maybe. But not fly. The gleam would be distracting.
So what you're saying is that the flight will operate in a similar fashion to other high-altitude commercial flights, say like Patrick Stewart's ill-famed Lear excursion a few years ago.
As I understand it, the dynamic pressure on the hull is never that great (somewhere around 200 mph perhaps?) so that aside from the pressue differential, a bail out would be survivable. But it would be a LONG ride down!
Speaking as someone who just had to create a representation of multidimensional data, guess what? People want little smiley faces, not the spinning Octabhedron of Eternal Sunshine, or whatever.
The human mind can only process so much information. I've found that once you go into 3-D, unless it represents some other, more familiar 3-D object the brain can recognize, it's just so much noise. But very pretty noise.
If you really love your ma, it's time to send her to programming language boot camp.
Up in the morning at the crack of 10 o'clock, web surfing and emails until lunch, then reprogramming your cell phone to play the old "Star Trek" game until mid afternoon. Then slop in a few lines of code in the IDE and go home.
And I wouldn't start with any kind of Basic or anything either. Why use a language called, after all, the Beginner's All-Purpose Symbolic Instruction code? Obviously that's not going to work.
After she learns Octal and Hex, you should start her on the only true programming lanugage: C. Preferably in one of the new GUI IDEs where everything has around 40-thousand lines of code linked in just to say "hello world." The first topic, of course, should be using multiple pointer indirection with function pointers. In Swahilli.
After a few days of that she won't bug you any more.
Now I have something to use at the bars to pick up chicks this weekend!
"Hey babe, I don't know how cute you think you are, but I know there are an infinite number of prime twins just waiting to factor this integer."
That number theory talk always gets them interested.
Slashdot Mirror
Aside from the fact that it seems this lady would give conspiracy theorists a bad name, isn't the problem in the name of the application: "E-Voting"?
Don't we want "E-Tallying" instead of E-Voting? I mean, I want to use a touch-screen kiosk and have my vote _instantly tallied_, with appropriate backups. I'm not looking to vote with my cell phone or anything, right? Who are giving requirements to these firms writing these systems, anyway? Sure -- if we're looking to do something like dial-a-vote, the system will of course be full of security holes.
We desperately need the private sector, and things like the X-Prize.
Anyone read "The Innovator's Dilemma"? The premise of the book is that radical changes (what the author calls "disruptive technologies") can never be supported by organizations attuned to the old technologies.
Getting into space cheaply is going to require disruptive technology -- big paradigm changes. Just the nature of large organizations will keep NASA from being able to recognize or implement it. Just look at their current ideas for "X-Prize"-like contests -- they want to spread too little money over too many technologies. Who wants to compete to make the best astronaut glove? It just goes to show the agency is not capable of the radical changes we need for our space program.
You say you're smart, but offer little to back it up except for wide-ranging tastes.
I would submit to you that there is a difference between a deep interest (reading up on linux or photography, taking some pictures or running a small darkroom) and honing a deep skill.
Smart people are good at all sorts of things. And people who are easily fascinated can find all sorts of neat stuff to do and play with.
If you want to succeed at anything, you're going to have to do two things: immerse yourself and surrender to your passion, and be able to do things you do not want to do. This is the balance between doing things society requires of you (socialization), and following your calling, your dreams.
Since you seem to be very good at getting slightly interested in things, I would suggest taking some time in your life to work on your socialization skills. Join the military if you have the guts, go to college or join the peace corps if you favor that. Whatever you choose, place yourself in a position where you must make a commitment and stick to it. Learn to do what others tell you to do, without question.
Then, and only then, sample around. Live and taste life -- but do so agressively, with someone in charge of your life (you). Not as a spectator, but as a participant in life. If you try hard enough, you'll find your calling. But it's up to you to prepare yourself so that when you do you'll be ready.
Come on, Nokia. Don't we geeks look stupid enough?
Now you've got us flapping our arms around at concerts trying to spell "Freebird". And just think of that waving around to make the message idea. Fairly soon you can walk into any office in the country and see people acting like a frightened chicken trying to make a point to a person 2-feet away?!?
What's next, a torso-mounted hoola-hoop that lets you surf the web? A facial-tick reader that checks the weather for you?
I liked the pocket protectors better.
Whether you are waving your arm in a straght line? Seems like when you wave your arm it makes more of an arc than a line. I wonder if the phone compensates.
And you wouldn't want to send a long message on a subway -- you'd end up whacking the people around you trying to work it out. Back up, buddy! I've got a phone here!
Oops.
Ok. One guy golfs, the other guy has a head like a golf ball.
Seriously. It's interesting that if I wanted to take Patrick Stewart (old baldy) up for a ride in an airplane and do 70-degree banks, we have to have a parachute. But to shoot up 100Km in suborbital flight, a Mickey-mouse T-shirt and Raybans seem to work just fine.
The real question is: who would want to fly with Patrick Stewart anyway?!? Bowl, maybe. But not fly. The gleam would be distracting.
Makes sense to me.
So what you're saying is that the flight will operate in a similar fashion to other high-altitude commercial flights, say like Patrick Stewart's ill-famed Lear excursion a few years ago.
As I understand it, the dynamic pressure on the hull is never that great (somewhere around 200 mph perhaps?) so that aside from the pressue differential, a bail out would be survivable. But it would be a LONG ride down!
What else would be necessary?
Good question.
Besides an AI and GPS, some sort of pressure-suit/parachute combination makes sense to me.
I wonder if parachutes would be required? If so, would they work? If you step out of the plane at the peak and pull the rip-cord, what happens?
I agree that this is so much nonsense.
Speaking as someone who just had to create a representation of multidimensional data, guess what? People want little smiley faces, not the spinning Octabhedron of Eternal Sunshine, or whatever.
The human mind can only process so much information. I've found that once you go into 3-D, unless it represents some other, more familiar 3-D object the brain can recognize, it's just so much noise. But very pretty noise.
If you really love your ma, it's time to send her to programming language boot camp.
Up in the morning at the crack of 10 o'clock, web surfing and emails until lunch, then reprogramming your cell phone to play the old "Star Trek" game until mid afternoon. Then slop in a few lines of code in the IDE and go home.
And I wouldn't start with any kind of Basic or anything either. Why use a language called, after all, the Beginner's All-Purpose Symbolic Instruction code? Obviously that's not going to work.
After she learns Octal and Hex, you should start her on the only true programming lanugage: C. Preferably in one of the new GUI IDEs where everything has around 40-thousand lines of code linked in just to say "hello world." The first topic, of course, should be using multiple pointer indirection with function pointers. In Swahilli.
After a few days of that she won't bug you any more.
Now I have something to use at the bars to pick up chicks this weekend! "Hey babe, I don't know how cute you think you are, but I know there are an infinite number of prime twins just waiting to factor this integer." That number theory talk always gets them interested.